The JoVE video player is compatible with HTML5 and Adobe Flash. Older browsers that do not support HTML5 and the H.264 video codec will still use a Flash-based video player. We recommend downloading the newest version of Flash here, but we support all versions 10 and above.

Neurodegenerative diseases comprise both hereditary and sporadic conditions characterized by an identifying progressive nervous system dysfunction and distinctive neuopathophysiology. The majority are of non-familial etiology and hence environmental factors and lifestyle play key roles in their pathogenesis. The extensive use of and ever increasing worldwide demand for electricity has stimulated societal and scientific interest on the environmental exposure to low frequency electromagnetic fields (EMFs) on human health. Epidemiological studies suggest a positive association between 50/60-Hz power transmission fields and leukemia or lymphoma development. Consequent to the association between EMFs and induction of oxidative stress, concerns relating to development of neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer disease (AD), have been voiced as the brain consumes the greatest fraction of oxygen and is particularly vulnerable to oxidative stress. Exposure to extremely low frequency (ELF)-EMFs are reported to alter animal behavior and modulate biological variables, including gene expression, regulation of cell survival, promotion of cellular differentiation, and changes in cerebral blood flow in aged AD transgenic mice. Alterations in inflammatory responses have also been reported, but how these actions impact human health remains unknown. We hence evaluated the effects of an electromagnetic wave (magnetic field intensity 1 mT; frequency, 50-Hz) on a well-characterized immortalized neuronal cell model, human SH-SY5Y cells. ELF-EMF exposure elevated the expession of NOS and O2(-), which were countered by compensatory changes in antioxidant catylase (CAT) activity and enzymatic kinetic parameters related to CYP-450 and CAT activity. Actions of ELF-EMFs on cytokine gene expression were additionally evaluated and found rapidly modified. Confronted with co-exposure to H2O2-induced oxidative stress, ELF-EMF proved not as well counteracted and resulted in a decline in CAT activity and a rise in O2(-) levels. Together these studies support the further evaluation of ELF-EMF exposure in cellular and in vivo preclinical models to define mechanisms potentially impacted in humans.

High levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS) may cause a change of cellular redox state towards oxidative stress condition. This situation causes oxidation of molecules (lipid, DNA, protein) and leads to cell death. Oxidative stress also impacts the progression of several pathological conditions such as diabetes, retinopathies, neurodegeneration, and cancer. Thus, it is important to define tools to investigate oxidative stress conditions not only at the level of single cells but also in the context of whole organisms. Here, we consider the zebrafish embryo as a useful in vivo system to perform such studies and present a protocol to measure in vivo oxidative stress. Taking advantage of fluorescent ROS probes and zebrafish transgenic fluorescent lines, we develop two different methods to measure oxidative stress in vivo: i) a “whole embryo ROS-detection method” for qualitative measurement of oxidative stress and ii) a “single-cell ROS detection method” for quantitative measurements of oxidative stress. Herein, we demonstrate the efficacy of these procedures by increasing oxidative stress in tissues by oxidant agents and physiological or genetic methods. This protocol is amenable for forward genetic screens and it will help address cause-effect relationships of ROS in animal models of oxidative stress-related pathologies such as neurological disorders and cancer.

Neuroinflammation is a complex innate immune response vital to the healthy function of the central nervous system (CNS). Under normal conditions, an intricate network of inducers, detectors, and activators rapidly responds to neuron damage, infection or other immune infractions. This inflammation of immune cells is intimately associated with the pathology of neurodegenerative disorders, such as Parkinson's disease (PD), Alzheimer's disease and ALS. Under compromised disease states, chronic inflammation, intended to minimize neuron damage, may lead to an over-excitation of the immune cells, ultimately resulting in the exacerbation of disease progression. For example, loss of dopaminergic neurons in the midbrain, a hallmark of PD, is accelerated by the excessive activation of the inflammatory response. Though the cause of PD is largely unknown, exposure to environmental toxins has been implicated in the onset of sporadic cases. The herbicide paraquat, for example, has been shown to induce Parkinsonian-like pathology in several animal models, including Drosophila melanogaster. Here, we have used the conserved innate immune response in Drosophila to develop an assay capable of detecting varying levels of nitric oxide, a cell-signaling molecule critical to the activation of the inflammatory response cascade and targeted neuron death. Using paraquat-induced neuronal damage, we assess the impact of these immune insults on neuroinflammatory stimulation through the use of a novel, quantitative assay. Whole brains are fully extracted from flies either exposed to neurotoxins or of genotypes that elevate susceptibility to neurodegeneration then incubated in cell-culture media. Then, using the principles of the Griess reagent reaction, we are able to detect minor changes in the secretion of nitric oxide into cell-culture media, essentially creating a primary live-tissue model in a simple procedure. The utility of this model is amplified by the robust genetic and molecular complexity of Drosophila melanogaster, and this assay can be modified to be applicable to other Drosophila tissues or even other small, whole-organism inflammation models.

Characterization of Complex Systems Using the Design of Experiments Approach: Transient Protein Expression in Tobacco as a Case Study

Authors: Johannes Felix Buyel, Rainer Fischer.

Institutions: RWTH Aachen University, Fraunhofer Gesellschaft.

Plants provide multiple benefits for the production of biopharmaceuticals including low costs, scalability, and safety. Transient expression offers the additional advantage of short development and production times, but expression levels can vary significantly between batches thus giving rise to regulatory concerns in the context of good manufacturing practice. We used a design of experiments (DoE) approach to determine the impact of major factors such as regulatory elements in the expression construct, plant growth and development parameters, and the incubation conditions during expression, on the variability of expression between batches. We tested plants expressing a model anti-HIV monoclonal antibody (2G12) and a fluorescent marker protein (DsRed). We discuss the rationale for selecting certain properties of the model and identify its potential limitations. The general approach can easily be transferred to other problems because the principles of the model are broadly applicable: knowledge-based parameter selection, complexity reduction by splitting the initial problem into smaller modules, software-guided setup of optimal experiment combinations and step-wise design augmentation. Therefore, the methodology is not only useful for characterizing protein expression in plants but also for the investigation of other complex systems lacking a mechanistic description. The predictive equations describing the interconnectivity between parameters can be used to establish mechanistic models for other complex systems.

The blood brain barrier (BBB) specifically regulates molecular and cellular flux between the blood and the nervous tissue. Our aim was to develop and characterize a highly reproducible rat syngeneic in vitro model of the BBB using co-cultures of primary rat brain endothelial cells (RBEC) and astrocytes to study receptors involved in transcytosis across the endothelial cell monolayer. Astrocytes were isolated by mechanical dissection following trypsin digestion and were frozen for later co-culture. RBEC were isolated from 5-week-old rat cortices. The brains were cleaned of meninges and white matter, and mechanically dissociated following enzymatic digestion. Thereafter, the tissue homogenate was centrifuged in bovine serum albumin to separate vessel fragments from nervous tissue. The vessel fragments underwent a second enzymatic digestion to free endothelial cells from their extracellular matrix. The remaining contaminating cells such as pericytes were further eliminated by plating the microvessel fragments in puromycin-containing medium. They were then passaged onto filters for co-culture with astrocytes grown on the bottom of the wells. RBEC expressed high levels of tight junction (TJ) proteins such as occludin, claudin-5 and ZO-1 with a typical localization at the cell borders. The transendothelial electrical resistance (TEER) of brain endothelial monolayers, indicating the tightness of TJs reached 300 ohm·cm2 on average. The endothelial permeability coefficients (Pe) for lucifer yellow (LY) was highly reproducible with an average of 0.26 ± 0.11 x 10-3 cm/min. Brain endothelial cells organized in monolayers expressed the efflux transporter P-glycoprotein (P-gp), showed a polarized transport of rhodamine 123, a ligand for P-gp, and showed specific transport of transferrin-Cy3 and DiILDL across the endothelial cell monolayer. In conclusion, we provide a protocol for setting up an in vitro BBB model that is highly reproducible due to the quality assurance methods, and that is suitable for research on BBB transporters and receptors.

Mitochondrial dysfunction is known to play a significant role in a number of pathological conditions such as atherosclerosis, diabetes, septic shock, and neurodegenerative diseases but assessing changes in bioenergetic function in patients is challenging. Although diseases such as diabetes or atherosclerosis present clinically with specific organ impairment, the systemic components of the pathology, such as hyperglycemia or inflammation, can alter bioenergetic function in circulating leukocytes or platelets. This concept has been recognized for some time but its widespread application has been constrained by the large number of primary cells needed for bioenergetic analysis. This technical limitation has been overcome by combining the specificity of the magnetic bead isolation techniques, cell adhesion techniques, which allow cells to be attached without activation to microplates, and the sensitivity of new technologies designed for high throughput microplate respirometry. An example of this equipment is the extracellular flux analyzer. Such instrumentation typically uses oxygen and pH sensitive probes to measure rates of change in these parameters in adherent cells, which can then be related to metabolism. Here we detail the methods for the isolation and plating of monocytes, lymphocytes, neutrophils and platelets, without activation, from human blood and the analysis of mitochondrial bioenergetic function in these cells. In addition, we demonstrate how the oxidative burst in monocytes and neutrophils can also be measured in the same samples. Since these methods use only 8-20 ml human blood they have potential for monitoring reactive oxygen species generation and bioenergetics in a clinical setting.

Institutions: University of Helsinki, Neurotar LTD, University of Eastern Finland, University of Helsinki.

It is widely acknowledged that the use of general anesthetics can undermine the relevance of electrophysiological or microscopical data obtained from a living animal’s brain. Moreover, the lengthy recovery from anesthesia limits the frequency of repeated recording/imaging episodes in longitudinal studies. Hence, new methods that would allow stable recordings from non-anesthetized behaving mice are expected to advance the fields of cellular and cognitive neurosciences. Existing solutions range from mere physical restraint to more sophisticated approaches, such as linear and spherical treadmills used in combination with computer-generated virtual reality. Here, a novel method is described where a head-fixed mouse can move around an air-lifted mobile homecage and explore its environment under stress-free conditions. This method allows researchers to perform behavioral tests (e.g., learning, habituation or novel object recognition) simultaneously with two-photon microscopic imaging and/or patch-clamp recordings, all combined in a single experiment. This video-article describes the use of the awake animal head fixation device (mobile homecage), demonstrates the procedures of animal habituation, and exemplifies a number of possible applications of the method.

Institutions: University of California Riverside, University of California Riverside, University of California Riverside.

Close to two decades of research has established that astrocytes in situ and in vivo express numerous G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) that can be stimulated by neuronally-released transmitter. However, the ability of astrocytic receptors to exhibit plasticity in response to changes in neuronal activity has received little attention. Here we describe a model system that can be used to globally scale up or down astrocytic group I metabotropic glutamate receptors (mGluRs) in acute brain slices. Included are methods on how to prepare parasagittal hippocampal slices, construct chambers suitable for long-term slice incubation, bidirectionally manipulate neuronal action potential frequency, load astrocytes and astrocyte processes with fluorescent Ca2+ indicator, and measure changes in astrocytic Gq GPCR activity by recording spontaneous and evoked astrocyte Ca2+ events using confocal microscopy. In essence, a “calcium roadmap” is provided for how to measure plasticity of astrocytic Gq GPCRs. Applications of the technique for study of astrocytes are discussed. Having an understanding of how astrocytic receptor signaling is affected by changes in neuronal activity has important implications for both normal synaptic function as well as processes underlying neurological disorders and neurodegenerative disease.

The zebrafish model has emerged as a relevant system to study kidney development, regeneration and disease. Both the embryonic and adult zebrafish kidneys are composed of functional units known as nephrons, which are highly conserved with other vertebrates, including mammals. Research in zebrafish has recently demonstrated that two distinctive phenomena transpire after adult nephrons incur damage: first, there is robust regeneration within existing nephrons that replaces the destroyed tubule epithelial cells; second, entirely new nephrons are produced from renal progenitors in a process known as neonephrogenesis. In contrast, humans and other mammals seem to have only a limited ability for nephron epithelial regeneration. To date, the mechanisms responsible for these kidney regeneration phenomena remain poorly understood. Since adult zebrafish kidneys undergo both nephron epithelial regeneration and neonephrogenesis, they provide an outstanding experimental paradigm to study these events. Further, there is a wide range of genetic and pharmacological tools available in the zebrafish model that can be used to delineate the cellular and molecular mechanisms that regulate renal regeneration. One essential aspect of such research is the evaluation of nephron structure and function. This protocol describes a set of labeling techniques that can be used to gauge renal composition and test nephron functionality in the adult zebrafish kidney. Thus, these methods are widely applicable to the future phenotypic characterization of adult zebrafish kidney injury paradigms, which include but are not limited to, nephrotoxicant exposure regimes or genetic methods of targeted cell death such as the nitroreductase mediated cell ablation technique. Further, these methods could be used to study genetic perturbations in adult kidney formation and could also be applied to assess renal status during chronic disease modeling.

Getting to Compliance in Forced Exercise in Rodents: A Critical Standard to Evaluate Exercise Impact in Aging-related Disorders and Disease

Authors: Jennifer C. Arnold, Michael F. Salvatore.

Institutions: Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center.

There is a major increase in the awareness of the positive impact of exercise on improving several disease states with neurobiological basis; these include improving cognitive function and physical performance. As a result, there is an increase in the number of animal studies employing exercise. It is argued that one intrinsic value of forced exercise is that the investigator has control over the factors that can influence the impact of exercise on behavioral outcomes, notably exercise frequency, duration, and intensity of the exercise regimen. However, compliance in forced exercise regimens may be an issue, particularly if potential confounds of employing foot-shock are to be avoided. It is also important to consider that since most cognitive and locomotor impairments strike in the aged individual, determining impact of exercise on these impairments should consider using aged rodents with a highest possible level of compliance to ensure minimal need for test subjects. Here, the pertinent steps and considerations necessary to achieve nearly 100% compliance to treadmill exercise in an aged rodent model will be presented and discussed. Notwithstanding the particular exercise regimen being employed by the investigator, our protocol should be of use to investigators that are particularly interested in the potential impact of forced exercise on aging-related impairments, including aging-related Parkinsonism and Parkinson’s disease.

The development of more predictive and biologically relevant in vitro assays is predicated on the advancement of versatile cell culture systems which facilitate the functional assessment of the seeded cells. To that end, microscale cantilever technology offers a platform with which to measure the contractile functionality of a range of cell types, including skeletal, cardiac, and smooth muscle cells, through assessment of contraction induced substrate bending. Application of multiplexed cantilever arrays provides the means to develop moderate to high-throughput protocols for assessing drug efficacy and toxicity, disease phenotype and progression, as well as neuromuscular and other cell-cell interactions. This manuscript provides the details for fabricating reliable cantilever arrays for this purpose, and the methods required to successfully culture cells on these surfaces. Further description is provided on the steps necessary to perform functional analysis of contractile cell types maintained on such arrays using a novel laser and photo-detector system. The representative data provided highlights the precision and reproducible nature of the analysis of contractile function possible using this system, as well as the wide range of studies to which such technology can be applied. Successful widespread adoption of this system could provide investigators with the means to perform rapid, low cost functional studies in vitro, leading to more accurate predictions of tissue performance, disease development and response to novel therapeutic treatment.

Institutions: University of Colorado School of Medicine, Oregon Health & Science University, University of Colorado School of Medicine.

Sex differences in neuronal susceptibility to ischemic injury and neurodegenerative disease have long been observed, but the signaling mechanisms responsible for those differences remain unclear. Primary disassociated embryonic neuronal culture provides a simplified experimental model with which to investigate the neuronal cell signaling involved in cell death as a result of ischemia or disease; however, most neuronal cultures used in research today are mixed sex. Researchers can and do test the effects of sex steroid treatment in mixed sex neuronal cultures in models of neuronal injury and disease, but accumulating evidence suggests that the female brain responds to androgens, estrogens, and progesterone differently than the male brain. Furthermore, neonate male and female rodents respond differently to ischemic injury, with males experiencing greater injury following cerebral ischemia than females. Thus, mixed sex neuronal cultures might obscure and confound the experimental results; important information might be missed. For this reason, the Herson Lab at the University of Colorado School of Medicine routinely prepares sex-stratified primary disassociated embryonic neuronal cultures from both hippocampus and cortex. Embryos are sexed before harvesting of brain tissue and male and female tissue are disassociated separately, plated separately, and maintained separately. Using this method, the Herson Lab has demonstrated a male-specific role for the ion channel TRPM2 in ischemic cell death. In this manuscript, we share and discuss our protocol for sexing embryonic mice and preparing sex-stratified hippocampal primary disassociated neuron cultures. This method can be adapted to prepare sex-stratified cortical cultures and the method for embryo sexing can be used in conjunction with other protocols for any study in which sex is thought to be an important determinant of outcome.

Mast cells play important roles in allergic disease and immune defense against parasites. Once activated (e.g. by an allergen), they degranulate, a process that results in the exocytosis of allergic mediators. Modulation of mast cell degranulation by drugs and toxicants may have positive or adverse effects on human health. Mast cell function has been dissected in detail with the use of rat basophilic leukemia mast cells (RBL-2H3), a widely accepted model of human mucosal mast cells3-5. Mast cell granule component and the allergic mediator β-hexosaminidase, which is released linearly in tandem with histamine from mast cells6, can easily and reliably be measured through reaction with a fluorogenic substrate, yielding measurable fluorescence intensity in a microplate assay that is amenable to high-throughput studies1. Originally published by Naal et al.1, we have adapted this degranulation assay for the screening of drugs and toxicants and demonstrate its use here.
Triclosan is a broad-spectrum antibacterial agent that is present in many consumer products and has been found to be a therapeutic aid in human allergic skin disease7-11, although the mechanism for this effect is unknown. Here we demonstrate an assay for the effect of triclosan on mast cell degranulation. We recently showed that triclosan strongly affects mast cell function2. In an effort to avoid use of an organic solvent, triclosan is dissolved directly into aqueous buffer with heat and stirring, and resultant concentration is confirmed using UV-Vis spectrophotometry (using ε280 = 4,200 L/M/cm)12. This protocol has the potential to be used with a variety of chemicals to determine their effects on mast cell degranulation, and more broadly, their allergic potential.

We describe a protocol for establishing mouse models of periventricular leukomalacia (PVL). PVL is the predominant form of brain injury in premature infants and the most common antecedent of cerebral palsy. PVL is characterized by periventricular white matter damage with prominent oligodendroglial injury. Hypoxia/ischemia with or without systemic infection/inflammation are the primary causes of PVL. We use P6 mice to create models of neonatal brain injury by the induction of hypoxia/ischemia with or without systemic infection/inflammation with unilateral carotid ligation followed by exposure to hypoxia with or without injection of the endotoxin lipopolysaccharide (LPS). Immunohistochemistry of myelin basic protein (MBP) or O1 and electron microscopic examination show prominent myelin loss in cerebral white matter with additional damage to the hippocampus and thalamus. Establishment of mouse models of PVL will greatly facilitate the study of disease pathogenesis using available transgenic mouse strains, conduction of drug trials in a relatively high throughput manner to identify candidate therapeutic agents, and testing of stem cell transplantation using immunodeficiency mouse strains.

How to Culture, Record and Stimulate Neuronal Networks on Micro-electrode Arrays (MEAs)

Authors: Chadwick M. Hales, John D. Rolston, Steve M. Potter.

Institutions: Emory University School of Medicine, University School of Medicine, Emory University School of Medicine.

For the last century, many neuroscientists around the world have dedicated their lives to understanding how neuronal networks work and why they stop working in various diseases. Studies have included neuropathological observation, fluorescent microscopy with genetic labeling, and intracellular recording in both dissociated neurons and slice preparations. This protocol discusses another technology, which involves growing dissociated neuronal cultures on micro-electrode arrays (also called multi-electrode arrays, MEAs).
There are multiple advantages to using this system over other technologies. Dissociated neuronal cultures on MEAs provide a simplified model in which network activity can be manipulated with electrical stimulation sequences through the array's multiple electrodes. Because the network is small, the impact of stimulation is limited to observable areas, which is not the case in intact preparations. The cells grow in a monolayer making changes in morphology easy to monitor with various imaging techniques. Finally, cultures on MEAs can survive for over a year in vitro which removes any clear time limitations inherent with other culturing techniques.1
Our lab and others around the globe are utilizing this technology to ask important questions about neuronal networks. The purpose of this protocol is to provide the necessary information for setting up, caring for, recording from and electrically stimulating cultures on MEAs. In vitro networks provide a means for asking physiologically relevant questions at the network and cellular levels leading to a better understanding of brain function and dysfunction.

The purpose of this report is to help develop an understanding of the effects caused by ion gradients across a biological membrane. Two aspects that influence a cell's membrane potential and which we address in these experiments are: (1) Ion concentration of K+ on the outside of the membrane, and (2) the permeability of the membrane to specific ions. The crayfish abdominal extensor muscles are in groupings with some being tonic (slow) and others phasic (fast) in their biochemical and physiological phenotypes, as well as in their structure; the motor neurons that innervate these muscles are correspondingly different in functional characteristics. We use these muscles as well as the superficial, tonic abdominal flexor muscle to demonstrate properties in synaptic transmission. In addition, we introduce a sensory-CNS-motor neuron-muscle circuit to demonstrate the effect of cuticular sensory stimulation as well as the influence of neuromodulators on certain aspects of the circuit. With the techniques obtained in this exercise, one can begin to answer many questions remaining in other experimental preparations as well as in physiological applications related to medicine and health. We have demonstrated the usefulness of model invertebrate preparations to address fundamental questions pertinent to all animals.

Institutions: Western University of Health Sciences, Western University of Health Sciences, Products.

An often-suggested mechanism of virus induced neuronal damage is oxidative stress. Astrocytes have an important role in controlling oxidative stress of the Central Nervous System (CNS). Astrocytes help maintain a homeostatic environment for neurons as well as protecting neurons from Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS). CM-H2DCFDA is a cell-permeable indicator for the presence of ROS. CM-H2DCFDA enters the cell as a non-fluorescent compound, and becomes fluorescent after cellular esterases remove the acetate groups, and the compound is oxidized. The number of cells, measured by flow cytometry, that are found to be green fluorescing is an indication of the number of cells that are in an oxidative state. CM-H2DCFDA is susceptible to oxidation by a large number of different ROS. This lack of specificity, regarding which ROS can oxidize CM-H2DCFDA, makes this compound a valuable regent for use in the early stages of a pathogenesis investigation, as this assay can be used to screen for an oxidative cellular environment regardless of which oxygen radical or combination of ROS are responsible for the cellular conditions. Once it has been established that ROS are present by oxidation of CM-H2DCFDA, then additional experiments can be performed to determine which ROS or combination of ROSs are involved in the particular pathogenesis process. The results of this study demonstrate that with the addition of hydrogen peroxide an increase in CM-H2DCFDA fluoresce was detected relative to the saline controls, indicating that this assay is a valuable test for detecting an oxidative environment within G355-5 cells, a feline astrocyte cell line.

Reactive oxygen species include a number of molecules that damage DNA and RNA and oxidize proteins and lipids (lipid peroxydation). These reactive molecules contain an oxygen and include H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide), NO (nitric oxide), O2- (oxide anion), peroxynitrite (ONOO-), hydrochlorous acid (HOCl), and hydroxyl radical (OH-).
Oxidative species are produced not only under pathological situations (cancers, ischemic/reperfusion, neurologic and cardiovascular pathologies, infectious diseases, inflammatory diseases 1, autoimmune diseases 2, etc…) but also during physiological (non-pathological) situations such as cellular metabolism 3, 4. Indeed, ROS play important roles in many cellular signaling pathways (proliferation, cell activation 5, 6, migration 7 etc..). ROS can be detrimental (it is then referred to as "oxidative and nitrosative stress") when produced in high amounts in the intracellular compartments and cells generally respond to ROS by upregulating antioxidants such as superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and glutathione (GSH) that protects them by converting dangerous free radicals to harmless molecules (i.e. water). Vitamins C and E have also been described as ROS scavengers (antioxidants).
Free radicals are beneficial in low amounts 3. Macrophage and neutrophils-mediated immune responses involve the production and release of NO, which inhibits viruses, pathogens and tumor proliferation 8. NO also reacts with other ROS and thus, also has a role as a detoxifier (ROS scavenger). Finally NO acts on vessels to regulate blood flow which is important for the adaptation of muscle to prolonged exercise 9, 10. Several publications have also demonstrated that ROS are involved in insulin sensitivity 11, 12.
Numerous methods to evaluate ROS production are available. In this article we propose several simple, fast, and affordable assays; these assays have been validated by many publications and are routinely used to detect ROS or its effects in mammalian cells. While some of these assays detect multiple ROS, others detect only a single ROS.

Enhancement of Apoptotic and Autophagic Induction by a Novel Synthetic C-1 Analogue of 7-deoxypancratistatin in Human Breast Adenocarcinoma and Neuroblastoma Cells with Tamoxifen

Authors: Dennis Ma, Jonathan Collins, Tomas Hudlicky, Siyaram Pandey.

Institutions: University of Windsor, Brock University.

Breast cancer is one of the most common cancers amongst women in North America. Many current anti-cancer treatments, including ionizing radiation, induce apoptosis via DNA damage. Unfortunately, such treatments are non-selective to cancer cells and produce similar toxicity in normal cells. We have reported selective induction of apoptosis in cancer cells by the natural compound pancratistatin (PST). Recently, a novel PST analogue, a C-1 acetoxymethyl derivative of 7-deoxypancratistatin (JCTH-4), was produced by de novo synthesis and it exhibits comparable selective apoptosis inducing activity in several cancer cell lines. Recently, autophagy has been implicated in malignancies as both pro-survival and pro-death mechanisms in response to chemotherapy. Tamoxifen (TAM) has invariably demonstrated induction of pro-survival autophagy in numerous cancers. In this study, the efficacy of JCTH-4 alone and in combination with TAM to induce cell death in human breast cancer (MCF7) and neuroblastoma (SH-SY5Y) cells was evaluated. TAM alone induced autophagy, but insignificant cell death whereas JCTH-4 alone caused significant induction of apoptosis with some induction of autophagy. Interestingly, the combinatory treatment yielded a drastic increase in apoptotic and autophagic induction. We monitored time-dependent morphological changes in MCF7 cells undergoing TAM-induced autophagy, JCTH-4-induced apoptosis and autophagy, and accelerated cell death with combinatorial treatment using time-lapse microscopy. We have demonstrated these compounds to induce apoptosis/autophagy by mitochondrial targeting in these cancer cells. Importantly, these treatments did not affect the survival of noncancerous human fibroblasts. Thus, these results indicate that JCTH-4 in combination with TAM could be used as a safe and very potent anti-cancer therapy against breast cancer and neuroblastoma cells.

Institutions: University of Florida , University of Florida , University of Florida , University of Florida .

For the last decade, we have tried to understand the molecular and cellular mechanisms of neuronal degeneration using Drosophila as a model organism. Although fruit flies provide obvious experimental advantages, research on neurodegenerative diseases has mostly relied on traditional techniques, including genetic interaction, histology, immunofluorescence, and protein biochemistry. These techniques are effective for mechanistic, hypothesis-driven studies, which lead to a detailed understanding of the role of single genes in well-defined biological problems. However, neurodegenerative diseases are highly complex and affect multiple cellular organelles and processes over time. The advent of new technologies and the omics age provides a unique opportunity to understand the global cellular perturbations underlying complex diseases. Flexible model organisms such as Drosophila are ideal for adapting these new technologies because of their strong annotation and high tractability. One challenge with these small animals, though, is the purification of enough informational molecules (DNA, mRNA, protein, metabolites) from highly relevant tissues such as fly brains. Other challenges consist of collecting large numbers of flies for experimental replicates (critical for statistical robustness) and developing consistent procedures for the purification of high-quality biological material. Here, we describe the procedures for collecting thousands of fly heads and the extraction of transcripts and metabolites to understand how global changes in gene expression and metabolism contribute to neurodegenerative diseases. These procedures are easily scalable and can be applied to the study of proteomic and epigenomic contributions to disease.

Manual cell counts on a microscope are a sensitive means of assessing cellular viability but are time-consuming and therefore expensive. Computerized viability assays are expensive in terms of equipment but can be faster and more objective than manual cell counts. The present report describes the use of three such viability assays. Two of these assays are infrared and one is luminescent. Both infrared assays rely on a 16 bit Odyssey Imager. One infrared assay uses the DRAQ5 stain for nuclei combined with the Sapphire stain for cytosol and is visualized in the 700 nm channel. The other infrared assay, an In-Cell Western, uses antibodies against cytoskeletal proteins (α-tubulin or microtubule associated protein 2) and labels them in the 800 nm channel. The third viability assay is a commonly used luminescent assay for ATP, but we use a quarter of the recommended volume to save on cost. These measurements are all linear and correlate with the number of cells plated, but vary in sensitivity. All three assays circumvent time-consuming microscopy and sample the entire well, thereby reducing sampling error. Finally, all of the assays can easily be completed within one day of the end of the experiment, allowing greater numbers of experiments to be performed within short timeframes. However, they all rely on the assumption that cell numbers remain in proportion to signal strength after treatments, an assumption that is sometimes not met, especially for cellular ATP. Furthermore, if cells increase or decrease in size after treatment, this might affect signal strength without affecting cell number. We conclude that all viability assays, including manual counts, suffer from a number of caveats, but that computerized viability assays are well worth the initial investment. Using all three assays together yields a comprehensive view of cellular structure and function.

A Technique for Serial Collection of Cerebrospinal Fluid from the Cisterna Magna in Mouse

Authors: Li Liu, Karen Duff.

Institutions: Columbia University.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that is pathologically characterized by extracellular deposition of β-amyloid peptide (Aβ) and intraneuronal accumulation of hyperphosphorylated tau protein. Because cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) is in direct contact with the extracellular space of the brain, it provides a reflection of the biochemical changes in the brain in response to pathological processes. CSF from AD patients shows a decrease in the 42 amino-acid form of Aβ (Aβ42), and increases in total tau and hyperphosphorylated tau, though the mechanisms responsible for these changes are still not fully understood. Transgenic (Tg) mouse models of AD provide an excellent opportunity to investigate how and why Aβ or tau levels in CSF change as the disease progresses. Here, we demonstrate a refined cisterna magna puncture technique for CSF sampling from the mouse. This extremely gentle sampling technique allows serial CSF samples to be obtained from the same mouse at 2-3 month intervals which greatly minimizes the confounding effect of between-mouse variability in Aβ or tau levels, making it possible to detect subtle alterations over time. In combination with Aβ and tau ELISA, this technique will be useful for studies designed to investigate the relationship between the levels of CSF Aβ42 and tau, and their metabolism in the brain in AD mouse models. Studies in Tg mice could provide important validation as to the potential of CSF Aβ or tau levels to be used as biological markers for monitoring disease progression, and to monitor the effect of therapeutic interventions. As the mice can be sacrificed and the brains can be examined for biochemical or histological changes, the mechanisms underlying the CSF changes can be better assessed. These data are likely to be informative for interpretation of human AD CSF changes.

In this interview, Dr. Lindquist describes relationships between protein folding, prion diseases and neurodegenerative disorders. The problem of the protein folding is at the core of the modern biology. In addition to their traditional biochemical functions, proteins can mediate transfer of biological information and therefore can be considered a genetic material. This recently discovered function of proteins has important implications for studies of human disorders. Dr. Lindquist also describes current experimental approaches to investigate the mechanism of neurodegenerative diseases based on genetic studies in model organisms.

JoVE Visualize is a tool created to match the last 5 years of PubMed publications to methods in JoVE's video library.

How does it work?

We use abstracts found on PubMed and match them to JoVE videos to create a list of 10 to 30 related methods videos.

Video X seems to be unrelated to Abstract Y...

In developing our video relationships, we compare around 5 million PubMed articles to our library of over 4,500 methods videos. In some cases the language used in the PubMed abstracts makes matching that content to a JoVE video difficult. In other cases, there happens not to be any content in our video library that is relevant to the topic of a given abstract. In these cases, our algorithms are trying their best to display videos with relevant content, which can sometimes result in matched videos with only a slight relation.